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An Illustrated Guide to the Freshwater Ciliate Stentor is produced by Australian artist and microscopist David Seamer. The book is filled with line drawings by the author from live microscopic observations of 19 recognised species of the freshwater ciliate genus Stentor. The guide also provides information on other ciliates that may create confusion when trying to identifying Stentor. Sometimes called trumpet animalcules due to their shape, they are a genus of filter-feeding, heterotrophic ciliates that are among the largest known extant unicellular organisms. The guide contains descriptions and is spiralbound for ease of use while working at the microscope.
Read our interview with David here.
David Seamer was born in New Zealand in 1945. He attended Te Awamutu College where, during a double biology lesson in which the student examined ‘the cell’, he discovered the wondrous micro-world. Samples of pond water with Amoeba was the example provided but while the rest of the class became bored, he became fascinated with the other microscopic ‘bugs’ swimming about and drew them. After the lesson was over he asked the teacher about the other things and was shown a copy of Ward & Whipple’s Freshwater Biology - and was hooked.
From the age of about fifteen, he became fascinated by this freshwater micro-world and has spent his life exploring it. He was offered employment as an environmental consultant with various independent research institutes, such as the CSIRO and a number of local and state governments. In 1993, he converted an ex-school bus into a mobile home/laboratory and spent the next 25 years travelling around southeast Australia cataloguing the biodiversity of Australia’s freshwater algae and protozoa.
He is now permanently based in the Victorian country town of Wangaratta from where he continues to write and study.
